We seek a revolution in the water and public health of the 2 to 4 billion people in the world today who lack safely managed drinking water and sanitation.  At least 2 billion people use a drinking water source contaminated with feces; 4.4 billion people lack safely managed sanitation. Water contaminated with human and mammal feces transmits infectious diseases to people, especially children, resulting in sickness and death that is readily preventable.

     
Neighbor’s children in Parasi, Nepal, site of arsenic testing and detection in well water (left) School girl washing hands at taps available at the local school in the Terai region of Nepal (right). (Photos by S. Murcott)

There have been two huge water and public health revolutions in the 20th century.  In the early 20th c. a revolution occurred in developed countries with the advent of water treatment (coagulation, filtration, chlorination). This led to a huge increase in life expectancy in those regions in only one generation.

Invented in the 1940s, it wasn’t until the 1970s that oral rehydration therapy came into widespread use. This marked a second 20th c. water and public health revolution. Any housewife could prepare and administer the simple sugar and salt solution. She could either make up the recipe herself or purchase the oral hydration solution packets at an affordable price of between $0.03 to $0.20 from her local pharmacy. This intervention to prevent and treat dehydration due to diarrhea had a profound impact in preventing childhood deaths from cholera and other diarrheal diseases. Globally today, oral rehydration solution is used by over 40% of children with diarrhea worldwide. This was the work of an public-private partnership of public health workers, water professionals governments, non-profits and industry.

We believe that in the 21st century, the next water and public health revolution will be the widespread availability and affordability of simple, low-cost water testing and treatment products. H2O-2B seeks to highlight and showcase important work underway in this water and public health domain.